Peter Buffett, son of billionaire investor Warren Buffett, is an Emmy Award-winning composer, NY Times best-selling author and noted philanthropist. Currently, he is releasing socially-conscious music and touring his "Concert & Conversation" series in support of his book Life Is What You Make It .     

And then someone sees the power of that and puts up a tollbooth.

There is no such thing as original sin. Period. There is an original wound—the disconnection from source—that we’re all searching for. But that source is actually with us all the time—like Dorothy’s shoes. That’s what all the great teachers and prophets tell us.

But we’re so hungry for it that we’ll believe others before we believe ourselves. And before you know it, it’s a religion, a political system, a social construct.

It’s natural for man to create systems to create meaning. It’s happened since we came down from the trees (or wherever you believe we came from). Gods were in the seasons and then we domesticated plants. Gods were in the wild beasts and then we domesticated the animals. Gods were in the heavens and then we charted the stars and planets.

Only then did we start to look inward. It must be us! Monotheism begins ... science gets smaller ... psychological thought begins ... everything starts to look like a mechanism just waiting to be analyzed.

Culture is just a construct built to make sense of the world and our place in it.

And now—in this time and place—nearly every construct is broken. Education, politics, religion, and economic systems are all institutions that have lost the connection to the people within them. But we are still here.  

All you have to do is combine our knowledge of history with the lessons of nature to know that nothing lasts. So why do we hold on so tightly to things that no longer serve us? Fear, of course. And that’s what culture loves the most. Culture will hold on at any cost. It doesn’t care about you or me. And fear is the go-to position.

From the fear of God to the fear of paying the mortgage to the fear of not being seen as cool. It’s a lockdown. Culture has us in a chokehold.

But none of it is real. Oh, it looks real—unimaginable to get out of. That’s the neatest trick of all. But check your shoes: the power of God is within you.

It’s written that Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” And by neighbor, that means whatever relationship you happen to be in at the moment.

The divine is not in anything, but it’s between everything. 

Everything has turned into a transaction. But we live in a world of relationships.

Love is the only power that can counter fear. This is not a feel-good platitude. It’s truth. And sometimes it can be hard work, but not as hard as seeing children die and billions suffer. No prophet could have imagined that we would put this level of so-called profit over humanity.

It’s said that, for instance, these taxes on the rich will stifle capitalism. Seriously?? The most important thing to rich people is to get richer? What world do we live in that puts more stuff for people with a bunch of stuff above compassion?

The human experiment is about to fail. I don’t believe it will. But we must be willing to see the skin we’re in and that it’s infected with fear. It must be shed.

What do you think? Share your story at changeourstory.com. Visit www.peterbuffett.comto learn more and Change Our Story to join the conversation on how we all can become active participants in shaping our future.  

Peter Buffett, son of billionaire investor Warren Buffett, is an Emmy Award-winning composer, NY Times best-selling author and noted philanthropist. Currently, he is releasing socially-conscious music and touring his "Concert & Conversation" series in support of his book Life Is What You Make It .
 
 

I’ve just returned from China. And now that I have a small outlet for my thoughts, I might as well write them down and see if they make sense.

As many readers know, I’ve worked on musical projects that include many expressions of my deep feelings regarding American Indian—as well as any indigenous—culture. 

We all came from a tribe at some point in our past. But there are few people in the world that survive in the manner that we were once all accustomed to. As you might expect, I believe that our previous way of life had a lot of valuable components to it. But please don’t accuse me of romanticizing the past. I just wish we could have retained some of the important parts, specifically the parts around us being just a part of a larger world, a world that we were meant to live in relationship to—not in control of.

On my first trip to China, my “aha” moment was realizing that the country is, indeed, quite full of the same feeling that I had when I got to know people in “Indian Country.” I recognized a soul in China that I didn’t expect. And then it became obvious: the Chinese people are nearly all indigenous; the land they live on was inhabited by their ancestors for millennia.

What I was seeing was that same way of being that Columbus saw when he first landed. I quoted him in an earlier blog. But the upshot is that he met people with their hearts open. Ready and willing to listen, learn, share, have fun, believe in things, and connect.

I don’t go to China for commerce. I go there to share my story if it’s at all helpful. 

My book, has been met with great success in China. There are a couple of reasons for that, none probably more obvious than the fact that I am Warren Buffett’s son. But that’s absolutely fine with me. It gives me a key into a world I would have never seen. Now that I’m in, I’m having a look around.

I won’t lie: it takes a lot of energy. But it’s an interesting kind of effort. And I think that’s what happens when any two cultures meet.

Think of it as a pan of water. In its liquid state it’s very stable. And the same is true when it’s frozen. Those are like two different cultures. When the two states of being—with all the meanings and customs that they’re used to—meet, that’s where the energy of worlds colliding is released.

Here’s the tricky part about this exchange: When that relationship is forged with either side trying to get the better deal, as opposed to the better understanding, things can get a little ugly. Obviously, this can easily happen in any market driven relationship. And of course, whoever sets the measuring stick usually gets an advantage.

So here’s what I’m so struck by.

In China my book is entitled Be Yourself. And at first, I was thinking it was mostly written for the young adults in China that would be curious about the fact that I followed a very surprising—and, to them, inspiring—life path.

When I spent more time there, I was so struck by how much Western advertising for high end products I saw. And as I stepped further back and also got a little deeper into the experience of being there, I saw how the measuring stick of Western values was slowly being superimposed everywhere.

It starts simply enough with things like the Gregorian calendar. China still uses the Lunar Calendar for important dates. But otherwise, the gridlines of the West have been put to use on a daily basis.

But I love that the whole country has one time zone (even though it straddles five). I’ll bet in most of China they still say, “time to get up ... time to have lunch ...” etc. As opposed to “6:45” or “12:30.”

But when you start to see metrics in fashion, economics, real estate that all look pretty Western, it feels like putting a square peg in a round hole.

So I’ve come to learn that my Chinese book, Be Yourself, actually applies to the country at large. The development of a social system for mankind (I’m including all elements anyone can think of—politics, markets, medicine, education, etc.) is a work in progress. Sure China can learn things from other societies. But clearly, it must Be Itself. If it loses the centuries upon centuries of soul, the world loses. If the West insists on addicting the East to its version of growth and prosperity, I call this no different than the Opium Wars of the past.

I’m really not sure what to do about this other than say it out loud. Many of the Chinese people I speak to seem to be deeply concerned that China will lose something extremely rare and valuable in the rush towards a very confounding version of growth and happiness. And it’s not just the older people.

I know the culture still holds a deep sense of balance. It’s the heartbeat of any indigenous culture. If it stays strong, I believe there will be a better future for us all.

What do you think? Share your story at changeourstory.com . Visit www.peterbuffett.com to learn more and Change Our Story to join the conversation on how we all can become active participants in shaping our future.   

Peter Buffett, son of billionaire investor Warren Buffett, is an Emmy Award-winning composer, NY Times best-selling author and noted philanthropist. Currently, he is releasing socially-conscious music and touring his "Concert & Conversation" series in support of his book Life Is What You Make It . 



“(How You Want It) To Be” by Peter Buffett  

This is a song about understanding; about how the stories we believe might change if we saw the world through someone else's eyes. Of course we all know the old "walk a mile in someone's shoes" line. But somehow the reality of that is hard to achieve. Partly because there are around 14 billion pairs of shoes to fill.

I'm writing this as I ride a high speed train traveling through the Chinese countryside. How could I possibly ever know the intricacies of the lives I'm seeing from a relatively close distance while speeding along at 200 mph? I won't pretend to. But I can respect the fact that I never will, and honor their life as one that is as important as mine or someone dear to me.

Why can't we assume that everyone has a life as complex as our own? That everyone has family stories that haunt us or inspire us? That every culture has a history that shames us or makes us proud? And that, in truth, almost all stories hold both beauty and ugliness—perfection in the very lack of perfection.

The opening stanza plays off of the old joke that even a stopped clock tells the right time twice a day. It's the idea that everyone can be right sometimes. But how do we make room for all the rest? How do we allow for the messiness of the gray areas?

As we move further and further into a digital world, one that's made up of ones and zeros in almost every facet of life, how do we keep this binary imprint from seeping further and further into our everyday thinking? As George Bush Jr. so perfectly said in very black and white terms, "you're either with us or against us."

I believe that this kind of thinking will destroy us all.

As the song says:
You can be sure of
What you take care of
Will start taking care of you 

If we live a life of inclusiveness, we will be included in life.

What do you think? Share your story at changeourstory.com . Visit www.peterbuffett.com to learn more and Change Our Story to join the conversation on how we all can become active participants in shaping our future.  

Image courtesy of NeilsPhotography, licensed under Creative Commons.